"This transaction represents a major commitment to
strengthen and expand critical infrastructure for our nation's future,"
said Randall Stephenson, AT&T Chairman and CEO. "It will improve
network quality, and it will bring advanced LTE capabilities to more than 294
million people.

"This transaction delivers significant customer, shareowner
and public benefits that are available at this level only from the combination
of these two companies with complementary network technologies, spectrum
positions and operations. We are confident in our ability to execute a seamless
integration, and with additional spectrum and network capabilities, we can
better meet our customers’ current demands, build for the future and help
achieve the President’s goals for a high-speed, wirelessly connected America.”

The deal would of course have to be approved by U.S.
regulating bodies, but if all goes well, AT&T and Deutsche Telekom hope to
have the transition finalized within the next year.

AT&T is also looking to boost its nascent LTE efforts with
this transaction, and will bring the technology to 95 percent of the U.S.
population. AT&T will also spend an additional $8 billion over the next
five years to boost its infrastructure investment within the U.S.

We can only hope that the T-Mobile acquisition, broadened
LTE deployments, and increased spending on infrastructure will improve
AT&Ts famously "fragile" wireless network.

AT&T made headlines last week – and drew the wrath of
many – when it announced that it would
start cracking down on users that were using “illegal” jailbreak apps to
tether data with their smartphones.

Comments

Threshold

Username

Password

remember me

This article is over a month old, voting and posting comments is disabled

quote: So whatever AT&T does/has done in the past will be something that T-Mobile customers can look forward to.

Not me. I've stuck with T-Mobile because I have never had a dropped stationary call in over seven years, and I have a three-day-weekend plan with 600 minutes and unlimited calls Friday, Saturday and Sunday for $40. Even if AT&T continues to honor my plan, it's only a matter of time before I get stuck on its crappy network. I left AT&T for T-Mobile; I will not go back. Time to look at Sprint or Verizon. Sprint's Epic 4G with the keyboard was looking pretty nice, anyway, and I have a corporate Blackberry on Verizon.

As a T-Mobile customer I also will be jumping ship due to this news. It's sad too; as recently as yesterday I could have thought of nothing that would convince me to leave T-Mobile.... AT&T has managed to show me just how wrong I was.

If you do go Verizon i'd suggest getting a world phone or wait till LTE becomes a prominent feature. That is if you travel outside of the US a lot.

T-Mobile will be missed. It was the first cell phone provider I had while in high school and had to pay for out of my own pocket. Reliable enough and quite cheap. Bought an unlocked Samsung V205 and popped in my SIM. Later on I found myself away from major metropolitan areas quite often and switched to Verizon.

I had AT&T but at the racing school I went to it just wasn't getting a good signal. I had to drive to town just get decent service.